2017 President Cup: Team USA Holds 2-Point Lead Over International Team

The 2017 President Cup began with Team USA taking a 2-point lead over the International team after the first day at Liberty National Golf Club, New Jersey. The United States won 3 of 5 foursome matches and halved another, to enjoy 3.5-1.5 advantage in blustery winds that made club selection hard.

The International team, comprising players from different parts of the world except Europe, have now lost the opening session for the 6 successive times at the biennial event.

Nick Price, the captain of International team said, ”We’re one point better off then we were two years (ago). It was a brutal day to play golf. We got behind the eight-ball early with a few of our teams being two-down, three-down at the turn”.

Price added, ”But the guys rallied back great. Even though we’re two points behind, it was one of our strongest starts in foursomes on Thursday. So the team is not discouraged at all. We have a resilient team. They are raring to go tomorrow.”

Justin Thomas and Rickie Fowler had a 6 and 4 victory over Hideki Matsuyama and Charl Schwartzel in the first match, thus earning 1st point for US. The American pair Jordan Spieth and Patrick Reed also lead the team in match three by defeating Kim Si-woo and Emiliano Grillo 5 and 4.

Matt Kuchar paired with Dustin Johnson got 1up over Venezuelan Jhonattan Vegas and Australian Adam Scott. After that, Branden Grace and Louis Oosthuizen of International team gained 3-1 success over the Daniel Berger and Brooks Koepk. But soon, the Amercians Phil Mickelson and Kevin Kisner scored halved against Marc Leishman and Jason Day, thus ending the final score with 3.5-1.5.